the wild animal life of forest and plain to come to him as they came
to Adam when he first named them, has long since vanished. To hunt
with success one must be thoroughly versed in woodcraft, be possessed
of a good knowledge of the habits of game and the localities where
they are to be found at different seasons of the year, have a quick
eye to pick out a desirable head, and must be a reasonably fair judge
of distance, to gauge the proper elevation of a rifle. The happy
combination of these qualities make the skilled hunter; marksmanship,
provided it be fair, is the least important of all his qualifications.
There are a great many men who are good shots at a stationary target
who are bad shots at game; there are men who are good shots at game,
who are by no means experts in shooting at a mark. This statement
may seem paradoxical but readily admits of explanation. The marksman
has his range given him, he takes his time, and is not betrayed into
sudden action. Change these conditions and he is out of his element.
If his eye is not trained to judge distance in timber or on the plain,
he can easily misgauge it, and shooting at a moving object he cannot
take his time; the absence of any spot on the animal near the point
he is aiming at is another disadvantage to the man of the target. The
practiced hunter knows his distance; his keen eye readily distinguishes
his quarry, although it may blend with the landscape, so that the
unpracticed eye might easily overlook it; he is accustomed to take a
quick sight and shoot, making proper allowances for the moving object;
if a rapid advance is possible and necessary to cut off the game before
it can pass a given point for which it is heading, the hunter chooses
his course, as if by intuition, and often has a chance to get several
more shots where another would fail of his opportunity. The skill of
a hunter generally brings him within such proximity of game as to
relieve him of the necessity of making an extra difficult shot. It is
surprising how seldom the huntsman discharges his rifle compared to one
who practices at a target. The man who is fond of target practice will
probably use up as many rounds of ammunition in one afternoon shooting
at a mark as the average huntsman will consume in an entire year.
A sportsman who is a fair shot, and who goes to a locality where game
is fairly plentiful, has every reason in the world to expect success,
provided he is accompanied by a real hunter, such an one as I have
above described. It is very important to employ a competent guide if
one expects a successful hunt. When I speak of a competent guide I
mean a man who is a good hunter and also capable of managing a hunting
outfit.
Guides may be divided into three classes:
(1) Ordinary frauds who are watching an opportunity to “work” some
“dude,” by which name sportsmen are sometimes designated in the slang
of the country.
(2) Backwoodsmen who are good hunters and tireless and will supply a
sportsman with the best they know how to provide, but being ignorant of
the ordinary comforts of civilized life, treat their sportsmen with the
same cruel neglect to which they have accustomed themselves.
(3) The man who makes a regular business of acting as a guide, who is a
good hunter and who also knows how to provide a first-class outfit.
Game has greatly decreased before the advance of civilization and
the wanton slaughter which took no thought of the future; the wild
life which survives owes its preservation to the almost inaccessible
character of the country in which it has taken refuge, and to its own
cunning, which of necessity has become very acute.
To know the habitat of game and outwit its wariness requires the skill
of the practiced hunter.
We have heard a great deal about roughing it. That phrase as formerly
understood must be greatly qualified if the modern sportsman patronizes
an up-to-date outfit.
Going to a wild and rather inaccessible country has about it a certain
charm of novelty, and part of that charm grows out of the idea of
roughing it. Some people have a tendency to greatly exaggerate the
ordeals through which they pass in order that they may enhance
the interest of their experience. This goes with the weakness for
overstating the distance and increasing the apparent difficulty of
the shots which they make in securing their trophies, in which error
they are too frequently sustained by the somewhat elastic conscience
of the guide. This is an age of progress, and that phrase applies to
methods of enjoying sport quite as well as it does to anything else.
Having good sport with comfort in camp life is simply a question of
dollars and cents. The average person does not understand the present
conditions of sporting life in a wild country.
It must be borne in mind that in traveling in rough sections of the
West, where big game still abounds, although in much smaller numbers
than formerly, everything has to be carried on pack horses. What you
are to take is limited simply by the supply of pack horses you are to
engage. In an up-to-date outfit the open camp-fire, such a picturesque
feature in an illustration, has been supplanted by a plain sheet-iron
stove which is placed in the tent, with a few feet of pipe attached
to carry off the smoke. If one wants the open fire it of course can
be easily supplied, and at first a good many sportsmen desire it on
account of the romance and novelty of the experience, but the same
pampered tastes, which have forced man from a savage life to adopt the
comforts which civilization supplies, will invariably lead to the open
camp-fire being abandoned for the commonplace sheet-iron stove--very
unromantic but thoroughly practical and useful. The open camp-fire,
with the smoke blowing in your eyes from every direction, which gives
the sensation of being scorched on one side and frozen on the other,
does not appeal to the modern sportsman who disassociates sport from
martyrdom.
Folding tables and chairs can be “packed” quite easily, and it is much
pleasanter to sit in a chair and eat off of a table than to sit on a
log trying to make a table of your knees, and occasionally converting
your lap into a plate for your spilled victuals. A portable rubber
bathtub, if one objects to jumping into cold water, satisfies the
desire for cleanliness. With a fire in the stove one can take a bath as
easily and comfortably in camp as at home. For thorough cleansing it
is best for one to take a bath in a tent in warm water, but I strongly
recommend to those who can stand it a plunge in cold water or being
soused with a bucket or two every morning before dressing for the day.
This stimulates the body and gets the system in fine condition.
For those who find it uncomfortable to sleep on the hard surface of
the ground I would recommend a pneumatic mattress. An ample supply of
canned stuff insures against the chance of bad cooking, because it
requires little or no skill to prepare canned provisions, if the other
food in camp is not particularly appetizing.
This article is not intended for the experienced hunter who has had
plenty of experience of Western hunting; nor is it intended for the man
who has his heart set upon roughing it in the sense that he desires to
see how much he can go through and survive. A great deal of the advice
given to people has been in the opposite direction, namely, to cut out
as much as possible from their hunting outfit. I claim that the average
person who desires sport with as little hardship as possible, except
what is unavoidable, should be very careful about reducing his outfit
too much. Most sportsmen are accustomed to the ordinary comforts and
conveniences of life. It is perfect folly for such people to attempt
in a short time to harden themselves to the frontier life so they may
endure its hardships with the same indifference as the hunter or
trapper who lives that way all the time. I have run across sportsmen
who have had their hunting trips spoiled by attempting to rough it
too much. If you are accustomed to living well and in comfort, it
would be wise to recognize the fact that you are a “tenderfoot” and
act accordingly. For the average sportsman the object of a hunting
trip in the West is to obtain diversion and acquire health. All the
roughing it one requires is the vigorous exercise, the fresh air, with
an occasional dip in ice cold water, which is conducive to health; the
rest of the hardship it is well to leave out as far as possible.
[Illustration: VIEW FROM MT. LEIDY.]
My experience has led me to add to a hunting outfit, the oftener I
go out, rather than depleting it. The first time I really saw an
up-to-date outfit was in 1902, when I engaged as my guide Edward
Sheffield, of Idaho. I joked him about all the things he was taking
along and called him a “tenderfoot.” He replied that “he had had
all the roughing it he wanted in his time, and those who really knew
what it was generally preferred a camp as comfortable as possible.” I
experienced during that trip and a subsequent one I took next fall such
comfort, combined with good sport, as I never had before.
I would advise taking an emergency medical case supplied with all the
ordinary remedies. I have known the time when such a thing has proved
extremely useful, and I have also known of sportsmen who have had their
outing ruined through lack of some simple remedy.
AN ELK HUNT IN WYOMING
When I wrote to my old guide Edward Sheffield, I was somewhat
apprehensive about the outlook for sport, because I had heard that the
best part of the Jackson Hole Country had been included in the reserve
set apart by the State of Wyoming, where sport with big game had been
entirely interdicted.
I was advised, however, that this was not the fact, and pinning my
faith to the good judgment of the guide, I made arrangements for a fall
hunt. Before reaching the terminal of the railroad journey I chanced
to meet some sportsmen who discussed the sport and commented on the
conditions existing in Jackson’s Hole. The criticisms were by no means
favorable, and various instances were cited of parties who had been
disappointed in their expectations. My subsequent experience only
served to convince me how dependent a sportsman has become upon the
services of a good guide.
The trip from St. Anthony to Jackson was without incident worth
relating, except at the start. The pack horses, which, during their
stay in town, had fared handsomely on oats and hay and been well
sheltered, did not look forward to a trip back into the bleak and
sterile mountains with the same pleasure that I did; their refractory
souls yearned for the comfortable quarters they were just leaving with
the same tenacity that the children of Israel in the wilderness “longed
for the fleshpots of Egypt,” but here the comparison ends, for they had
not a guide who was meek and gentle like Moses.
About a mile from St. Anthony the whole bunch turned off on a side road
and went back to their former quarters. After some delay they were
finally got in line again, and with the aid of a couple of Mormons,
who, for a consideration, agreed to help them for several miles, we got
the pack train properly started, and after that had no further trouble
with them.
[Illustration: GUIDE EDWARD SHEFFIELD AND TWO ELK HEADS.]
The journey was a fairly long one, but it became more interesting as
we drew away from civilization and got closer to the place where we
intended to make permanent camp. After the first day we passed the wide
monotonous stretch of sage brush flats which lies between St. Anthony
and Victor; after that the landscape grew more mountainous and wooded.
The country became very picturesque as we proceeded; every mountain
presented a view which was a panorama; every opening in the timber
seemed a natural frame for an entrancing picture; the atmosphere so
clear and bracing gave fine definition to objects in view; the winding
river rushed fretting and foaming between the rocks in the valley
below; large clumps of spruces clustered upon the mountain sides, and
the rough crags were powdered with snow and sometimes glistening with
rills which coursed down their rugged surfaces. After traveling along
the Gros Ventre River for a considerable distance we at last came in
view of Mt. Leidy, superbly situated between two rows of mountains
on either side of a pleasant valley, at the head of which that peak
stands. The ground was covered with a few inches of snow--enough to
make good hunting. We made an early camp and had plenty of time to get
everything arranged before it became dark. The location was ideal;
plenty of timber nearby; a fine stream of clear, cold water, and good
grazing for the horses. It was quite important to have a good range
for the stock, because there were eleven pack horses and three riding
horses--fourteen in all. To take care of these required the services of
a horse wrangler. I had three men, my regular guide, Edward Sheffield;
Charles Herdick, a Wyoming guide, and Marcus Imo, who cooked and
turned his hand to anything else that had to be attended to.
The day being young when we arrived, I employed it in making a short
hunting scout. Charles Herdick went with me, and I soon discovered how
much my wind had deteriorated since I had last been out, for in the
meantime I had lived a life of comparative ease. The general elevation
in this section ranges from 7,000 to 10,000 feet, and it takes a few
days to accustom your lungs to the rarified atmosphere. When one is
not taking any vigorous exercise the climate feels exhilarating and
inspires one with the belief that he is able to perform any kind of
feat; a few minutes of real strenuous exercise and this delusion is
destroyed. I soon discovered that Herdick was a good hand at mountain
climbing, being wonderfully supple and possessed of the best pair of
lungs of anyone I ever knew.
We finally caught sight of a small bunch of elk at a considerable
distance. As they were moving over a crest of a hill it became
necessary to travel with speed to get near enough for a shot, if by
chance there should be a good head in the bunch. The elk had not seen
us, but were moving and might get out of range. Completely exhausted
I finally gained the summit of a hill overlooking the herd, which had
halted. An old bull stood in the quaking aspens, not over sixty yards
away. A glance at the head, and I saw that I had had my pains for
nothing. I watched the animals for a few moments, and they seemed to me
like old acquaintances, for it had been three years since I last hunted
this kind of game. I do not believe they were as pleased to see me as
I was to see them. They soon started to run directly from us in the
direction of camp, which was quite near. My guide, Edward Sheffield,
told me afterward that they came very near, and he was afraid they
would run through camp. He gravely warned me against the danger of
driving a large bunch of “Uncle Sam’s cattle” in that direction.
It was a pleasure after this little excitement to drop into a
comfortable camp and find everything nicely arranged and a good meal
provided. My quarters were supplied with every convenience that could
be expected by one who travels with a pack outfit. It may, perhaps,
interest those who have had no practical experience in Western hunting
to know what can be furnished. We had folding chairs, a folding table,
two tents, and in each a portable sheet-iron stove with a couple of
lengths of pipe to take off the smoke. I had a pneumatic mattress
to save my tired flesh from the hard ground, and whatever else was
required which horses could pack in. When I was tired of hunting I
could rest a day or so and read novels in a comfortable tent, no
matter how cold the weather. This does not seem like roughing it. The
frontiersman of former days would have thought such comfort with a
hunting outfit impossible. Modern progress, however, has caused most of
the inconveniences of camp life to disappear as if by magic. Would that
its magic influence could restock the wilderness with the great herds
of wild animals that have vanished.
[Illustration: VALLEY OF GROS VENTRE.]
The following day I went out with the guide to try my luck. We had
not traveled more than two miles before discovering a small herd of
elk. We circled around them sufficiently to size them up, but could
find no heads worth picking out. Our course was then changed, and we
hunted toward a high mountain north of Mt. Leidy. From this point we
obtained a fine view of the surrounding country, which I carefully
swept with my Seitz glasses in quest of game. Far off on a distant
ridge we finally saw some elk slowly moving out of the timber into
the open. Their brown shapes showed very distinctly against the
snow-covered hills, but, although there was a considerable number in
view, no good antlers were visible. My strong glasses proved of very
great service to me. With them I could ascertain plainly what otherwise
I would have had to guess at, and they saved me many a long excursion
over rough country to determine the value of a set of antlers. My guide
was quite as anxious as myself that I should not have any trophies
unworthy of a sportsman’s ambition. The law allows one only two heads,
and it is necessary to take great pains to avoid making mistakes. I
made up my mind that I would go back empty-handed rather than pack out
antlers which would reflect discredit upon my skill. The guide was
particularly anxious that I should obtain specimens which would do
no injury to his reputation. I think I must have passed unfavorable
judgment upon twenty-five or thirty heads--for which the guide was
mainly responsible--before I finally secured my trophies. Any number of
bulls presented themselves, some of them quite easy marks, only to be
snubbed and turned down. Paris, in passing judgment upon the goddesses
to determine which was the most beautiful, could not have been more
critical or discriminating than the guide. I doubt if the unsuccessful
rivals of the bulls I finally chose as worthy specimens were seriously
disappointed.
To illustrate the ease with which I could have secured my legal
allowance of two bulls, to say nothing of cows, I will cite a few
instances of the opportunities I had. On one occasion I was going
through the timber where I heard a number of elk. The guide called my
attention to a bull lying on the ground not sixty yards away, partly
concealed by the spruce brush. He was facing directly toward us, his
front feet folded under his body and his nose close to the ground. We
stood quite still and surveyed him carefully, sizing up the head, which
had twelve points, but not large nor heavy at the base. The glasses
were brought into service to make a more critical examination. A couple
of minutes we stood discussing him, when finally he gave a brief snort,
which sounded like an expression of disgust at our impertinence, and
then jumped up and loped out of sight.
Shortly afterward we managed to approach close to a very large herd
of elk, mostly hidden in the timber. From our concealment we could
see a number of the animals not over thirty or forty yards away.
About 150 yards off were a couple of young bulls exercising their
skill by fencing with their antlers, evidently in sport. We could
hear the frequent clash of the horns and often got a good view of the
contestants. We waited in this spot over an hour, until despairing
of seeing anything worth shooting at before it grew too dark, we
suddenly rose up in plain view. The peaceful scene was soon converted
into one of great confusion. For a moment the elk stared at us with
their beautiful large brown eyes in astonishment, then a general panic
communicated itself to the herd, and every animal in sight began moving
off. Each clump of vegetation that could conceal a form seemed suddenly
animated by a creature breaking from its hiding place, fleeing for
safety; the cows and calves gave vent to their peculiar bleat of alarm,
while the bulls snorted and rattled their antlers against the trees in
their haste. For some hundred yards in the timber, and well up on the
mountain side, the scene became particularly animated. I hurried to an
opening in the timber, where I could get a good view of the retreating
herd, which had drawn together into quite a solid moving mass. The
number of elk greatly exceeded my expectations. Nine-tenths of the herd
had been as carefully concealed from us as we had been from them.
There must have been at a conservative estimate not less than 400 in
the herd, and possibly 500. A sportsman could only admire this striking
and beautiful spectacle because there was no head worth securing. A
tooth hunter or a butcher, with a high-power repeating rifle, could
have repeated one of those scenes which sickens every lover of sport.
At another time I came upon a band of elk quite as numerous, and,
although there were a couple of good heads in view, yet the number of
cow elk was so great that it was practically impossible to get a good
shot. The entire mass fled straight up the side of a steep mountain
covered with quaking aspen and spruce. For some time we could see them
crowding one another in dense masses in their ascent, but the only shot
attempted was with the camera, and without success.
One more instance, which will not only aid in proving the ease of
securing an indifferent specimen, but goes to show that when game is
too plentiful it is an actual handicap to the sportsman. I saw a fine
head across a gulch at a considerable distance. I fired and missed it
and the animal escaped beyond range. I crossed the gulch to examine the
spot where the bull had stood and followed his tracks to see if he had
been wounded, and if so, how badly. Although the ground was covered
with two feet of snow, yet I could discover no signs of blood. While
discussing the matter with the guide we became conscious that we were
not unperceived, for a great number of elk began to move among the
trees, having evidently “spotted” us. We made at once for concealment
and ran as fast as we could through the deep snow to an open place
toward which the herd was heading.
Carefully hidden from view we saw a great brown mass thunder past,
and before it had disappeared from sight I caught a glimpse of the
precious set of antlers belonging to the bull I shot at carried in
triumph out of sight. They appeared but for a moment in the narrow
opening, in which the intended victim was well protected by cows,
which formed a perfect wall of flesh which no bullet could pierce and
speed on to its mark. We made another run under concealment in the
hope of being able to come upon the herd again in case it should halt,
which it did. In an open space on the further side of the mountain
we confronted the elk at close quarters. The rapid traveling in the
deep snow over rough country left me very much exhausted. The first
object that attracted the attention of the guide and myself was a large
bull of twelve points at very close range. I thought in the hurry of
the moment, my vision perhaps being blurred by nervous strain and
exhaustion, that it was the same magnificent specimen I had shot at
before and was trying to secure, and the animal’s position--turned
quartering toward me--aided the deception. I soon discovered the
mistake, however, my attention being called by the guide to another
bull which proved to be the one I so earnestly desired. I brought my
rifle in position to draw a bead on a vital spot, but the bull was
immediately blanketed by several cows running between. If I could have
had a clear range the shot would have been about the easiest I ever
had, but the faithful cows with their calves swarmed around their
lord, and I beheld with disappointment as fine a pair of antlers as I
ever saw borne safely out of sight. The old bull must have evidently
believed that “there is safety in numbers.”
There is another disadvantage in encountering a great quantity of game
when attempting to secure a good trophy. Each animal, however poor a
head it may possess, has generally a good pair of eyes, a keen scent
and excellent hearing. Each addition to a herd is another sentinel,
always on duty and ready at any moment to sound the alarm. On a
previous hunting trip, when the elk were not nearly so plentiful, I
got the heads I wanted in less time. I cannot place the blame for the
trouble I had in securing my heads on the cows entirely.